Nelly
Nelly
Cornell Iral Haynes, Jr., known professionally as Nelly, is an American rapper, singer, songwriter, entrepreneur, investor, and occasional actor from St. Louis, Missouri. Nelly embarked on his music career with Midwest hip hop group St. Lunatics, in 1993 and signed to Universal Records in 1999. Under Universal, Nelly began his solo career in the year 2000, with his debut album Country Grammar, of which the title-track was a top ten hit. The album debuted at number three on the Billboard...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionRapper
Date of Birth2 November 1974
CityAustin, TX
CountryUnited States of America
Hip-hop is more than music, it's a culture. It's bigger than hit songs.
I wasn't a kid when I came out. Soulja Boy was 16. I'm saying that when he came out he was a kid so it was naturally a show for him. It's not about the music right away. It's a show for him. Not that he's not putting enough effort into his music, but how much effort can a 16 year old put into his music because as you mature and get older even the songs he's doing now has evolved and he's looking back.
You never know until a song comes out and becomes what it becomes, obviously you can't predict how the masses will react.
I write pop songs. But I think it is sprinkled with a lot of counter-culture references. It ranged from rap to hip hop to trip hop, house, drum and bass, and experimental and improv and jazz.
I stand for the Midwest. That's why the album's titled 'M.O.,' 'cause I'm still holding it down like that. My friends and family all call me Mo, so it's kind of like really representing where I'm from and me at the same time.
I think he's going down, ... It's gonna be the 'Revenge for O.J. '
Nobody got paid, it's all donation, it's all going to charity,
On fame: It all happened so fast. I'd wake up in the night and go, 'I can't believe it. I've gotta go to the bathroom!
It's more or less a unity thing, ... I think everybody wants to do something. Nobody knows exactly what to do, so everybody is doing a little bit of everything.
Strength of 100 men? I'd probably just get mad and hurt somebody and end up in jail. I think invisibility would probably be the best thing. I could be like, 'You know what, let me just see what these folks are talking about over here.' Then you could sneak into Rams cheerleaders' locker room.
I won an MVP trophy with the St. Louis Amateur Baseball Association. I didn't even start. I was a sub on this team. This was, like, an All-Star game where we had athletes from different teams, different mixtures. We had, like, the only black team in the league, basically. We had four players go to the All-Star game.
I guess coming after 'Country Grammar' and everybody thinking, 'Well maybe, that was it.' To come back with something like 'Nellyville' and to have people accept it and appreciate it the way they did, that was a great move.
You think you had it bad when somebody put out a rumor on you in the school; think about somebody putting a rumor out about you on the Internet.
My nickname used to be Moses - still is Moses - for a long time, and people just call me Mo for short.